A tentative framework for lean software enterprise research and development

Abstract

The current trends in most software development organizations are in striving for high performance while meeting the emergent and even rapidly changing customer needs. Traditional product development models are often ineffective in such respects. Now Lean and Agile software models address many of those particular concerns. However, empirical evidence of their actual performance effects is still scarce and probably many hidden inefficiencies exist in practical software projects. For example the Kanban process model is one of the latest proposals with apparent potential to improve the efficiency of the projects. This paper explores how software development activities and process improvement can be evaluated in such cases. A research model is constructed for the purpose of this investigation. New research hypotheses can be derived and tested empirically with case study projects. By applying the supported hypotheses in practice, the model is intended to be a systematic performance development vehicle for software projects and a provisional framework for the Lean software enterprise transformation research and development. © 2010 Springer-Verlag.